Marx and equality

[Wubbaz]

Greetings comrades!

I have recently begun my reading of the fabled Capital, which has proven to be quite an interesting read. Reading this book has sparked further interest into Marxism.

In particular, I am looking for knowledge about what Marx wrote on equality and inequality. I often hear that Communism seeks total equality of opportunity but also total equality of outcome. A great thinker such as Marx must have acknowledged that people, due to natural causes, are not born equal and it is therefore impossible to have equality of outcome.

Please enlighten me and share your knowledge and thoughts. :)

[caramelpence]

I often hear that Communism seeks total equality of opportunity but also total equality of outcome. A great thinker such as Marx must have acknowledged that people, due to natural causes, are not born equal and it is therefore impossible to have equality of outcome.

The text in which Marx has the most interesting things to say about Communism and equality is not Capital but his Critique of the Gotha Program, so I would give that a look. As for your suggestions, I don't think Marx did advocate equality of opportunity in the sense of a society in which people would be assured of equal starting-points and goods and offices would be distributed solely according to merit. Equality of opportunity is more often a value associated with social democracy rather than Marxism, and, whilst contested as a concept, in that there is no agreement on what preconditions have to be in place in order to secure equality of opportunity, as a standard of distribution it is compatible with significant inequalities in material wealth and does not recognize the importance of human need in guiding the distribution of goods. It is what theorists have in mind when they talk about expanding access to higher education and improving social mobility in capitalist societies, for example. Nor did Marx advocate equality of outcome in the sense of strict equality - this is associated with some aspects of the revolutionary socialist tradition, namely George Bernard Shaw, but not Marx.

In his Critique of the Gotha Program, Marx actually distinguishes between two different stages of Communist development. In the first stage he says that goods will be distributed according to how much work individuals do, so that individuals will be considered only in their capacity as workers and distribution will not take account of other variables and facts of social life such as how many family members workers have and whether they have different abilities and skill sets - Marx says that it is necessary to have this stage because a Communist society will still, initially, be tainted with the ideological remnants of capitalism. In a later stage, however, Marx says that goods will be distributed according to the maxim of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs". This maxim was probably derived from Saint-Simonism and Blanqui, and arguably it is not a standard of distribution in the traditional sense, like equality of opportunity or equality of outcome, because it does not focus only on one aspect of the human personality, but seeks to acknowledge the many-sided and complex condition of human existence and the individual human being, and distribute goods in a way that reflects that complexity and enables each individual to flourish in their own way.

[Savage]

The goal of communism as a movement isn't to create an absolutely equal society, of course we want to abolish class, but this does not mean that we want everyone to lead identical lives. In a communist society you contribute how you can and in return you receive what you need, you don't get payed equally because there is no remuneration in the wage form. Of course Marx acknowledged that people have different skills and different faults, In a communist society, If you're not good at maths you won't become a physicist, If you're not fit then you won't become a sports teacher.

[Broletariat]

No one wants equality of outcome.

Medicine for the sick not the healthy.

[Tim Finnegan]

The thing to remember is that the program of Marxism is a fundamental emancipatory one; the end goal is the general liberation of humanity, not the pursuit of material equality of outcome for its own sake.

[Wubbaz]

In a later stage, however, Marx says that goods will be distributed according to the maxim of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs". This maxim was probably derived from Saint-Simonism and Blanqui, and arguably it is not a standard of distribution in the traditional sense, like equality of opportunity or equality of outcome, because it does not focus only on one aspect of the human personality, but seeks to acknowledge the many-sided and complex condition of human existence and the individual human being, and distribute goods in a way that reflects that complexity and enables each individual to flourish in their own way.

First of all, thank you very much for your answers. This raises a few questions for me. In particular, I am interested in how this specific distribution, "from each according to ability, to each according to his needs", would work in practice. In a future late Communist society, I acknowledge the fact that our morals and world-views would be radically different than it is now. But how exactly do we get to the point where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is a sustainable way of distributing the material goods of society, and not lead to overcomsumption? In order words, how do we define our "needs" in a late Communist society?

[Gorilla]

First of all, thank you very much for your answers. This raises a few questions for me. In particular, I am interested in how this specific distribution, "from each according to ability, to each according to his needs", would work in practice. In a future late Communist society, I acknowledge the fact that our morals and world-views would be radically different than it is now. But how exactly do we get to the point where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is a sustainable way of distributing the material goods of society, and not lead to overcomsumption? In order words, how do we define our "needs" in a late Communist society?

If there was a good answer to that readily at hand, we'd be implementing it right now.

Marx outlines why and how the proletariat will take power for itself and why it must, unlike all ruling classes before it, abolish class society entirely. In works like the Communist Manifesto and the Program of the French Workers' Party, Marx outlines some of the first concrete steps that workers might take in that direction (e.g. universal suffrage, a progressive income tax, nationalizing telegraph and rail service, abolishing the right of inheritance for anyone but direct descendents, etc.) but the presumption is that the working class will find its own way. In this he differs from the utopian socialists, who all have very interesting and detailed ideas on the subject.

BTW: There's a letter somewhere where Engels mocks the French socialists for wanting to establish literal absolute material equality between everyone. He says that the goal of scientific socialism is only to abolish class distinctions - distinctions relating to the means of production.

[Desperado]

But how exactly do we get to the point where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is a sustainable way of distributing the material goods of society, and not lead to overcomsumption? In order words, how do we define our "needs" in a late Communist society?

Your "needs" are basically what you want, so long as you give what you can. Marx saw the sky as the limit to our technological advances (see his criticism of Malthus), and that capitalism would have lead us to a massive development in production before communism arrives. There would be no need to ration, as we would be in a land of plenty.

[ZeroNowhere]

BTW: There's a letter somewhere where Engels mocks the French socialists for wanting to establish literal absolute material equality between everyone. He says that the goal of scientific socialism is only to abolish class distinctions - distinctions relating to the means of production.
You are probably referring to this:

"The elimination of all social and political inequality,” rather than “the abolition of all class distinctions,” is similarly a most dubious expression. As between one country, one province and even one place and another, living conditions will always evince a certain inequality which may be reduced to a minimum but never wholly eliminated. The living conditions of Alpine dwellers will always be different from those of the plainsmen. The concept of a socialist society as a realm of equality is a one-sided French concept deriving from the old “liberty, equality, fraternity,” a concept which was justified in that, in its own time and place, it signified a phase of development, but which, like all the one-sided ideas of earlier socialist schools, ought now to be superseded, since they produce nothing but mental confusion, and more accurate ways of presenting the matter have been discovered.

[Sperm-Doll Setsuna]

First of all, thank you very much for your answers. This raises a few questions for me. In particular, I am interested in how this specific distribution, "from each according to ability, to each according to his needs", would work in practice. In a future late Communist society, I acknowledge the fact that our morals and world-views would be radically different than it is now. But how exactly do we get to the point where "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" is a sustainable way of distributing the material goods of society, and not lead to overcomsumption? In order words, how do we define our "needs" in a late Communist society?

"from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs" is not Marx. As far as I recall it's Marx quoting Laselle and mocking his utopianism.

[ZeroNowhere]

"from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs" is not Marx. As far as I recall it's Marx quoting Laselle and mocking his utopianism.
No, that was from Louis Blanc. And no, Marx was not mocking it, although he did not mean it as a description of all forms of communism either.

[Savage]

"from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs" is not Marx. As far as I recall it's Marx quoting Laselle and mocking his utopianism.

He was certainly not mocking it, but of course, as is evident in the text, he was referring specifically to the higher phase of communist society.


In a higher phase of communist society, after the enslaving subordination of the individual to the division of labor, and therewith also the antithesis between mental and physical labor, has vanished; after labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!

[Hit The North]

On the question of inequality, to abolish it isn't to abolish human difference; only the unequal rewards imposed upon those differences.

In class society, reward is based on ownership of capital, rather than individual ability, in most cases and most important cases.

Individual abilities, excepting those that are wholly derived from physical and morphological characteristics, are, to a large degree, transmitted through material culture rather than biological inheritance. In class society, the natural abilities of individuals are either nurtured or neutered according to that individual's place in the class structure. And, anyway, even physical differences are mediated by social class. Better nutrition contributes to stronger, healthier babies and, through its continuance, stronger, taller, healthier and longer-living adults.

The need to impose discipline on the proletariat, gives rise to hierarchies of power, which are reinforced through a general culture of inequality into which the proletariat is dragged as a participant in its manifestation as a consuming class.

In its international manifestation, modern class society divides the world up into pockets of alienated gluttony and pockets of desperate poverty. Billions of units of human potential are cast aside and reduced to barely human conditions of existence, out of necessity, in order to keep the system going. A situation of artificial scarcity prevails in order to preserve profitable private property.

Whatever prescriptions Marx or others have speculated upon for our communist future, these pale into insignificance compared with the urgent task of beginning the abolition of class society, its economic death camps, and its hierarchies of power and prestige.

[stella2010]

I often hear that Communism seeks total equality of opportunity but also total equality of outcome.

People in advanced countries like ourselves should be able to achieve this, unfortunately we are subjected to a hierarchical system by stealth. Those men and women in charge know no other way but that which is built up by us and is in their hands.

There is no point for us,they have absolute secrecy and that becomes absolute control.

The only task left for them is to continually divide and conquer.

They may be JUST elite...but they are much fewer.

Equality of outcome is something we should all support strongly

Adios COMRADES

[ZeroNowhere]

Equality of outcome is something we should all support strongly
I certainly don't want everybody to get the same use-values. It's not clear what this 'equality of outcome' is supposed to mean in any precise form here. In capitalism, it may make sense, insofar as goods are all reduced to the common form of value, money, and society's wealth is expressed in this, but not in a society based around production of use-values.